Conservationists Continue Push for More Regulation of Logging Roads

GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) — A conservation group said Wednesday it will continue pushing federal authorities to more closely regulate muddy logging roads, despite a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that sided with the timber industry.

Paul Kampmeier, a lawyer representing Northwest Environmental Defense Center, said the ruling still leaves room to pursue several avenues to get the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to take a tougher approach to pollution running off logging roads. The Supreme Court reversed a decision by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that EPA should regulate logging road runoff in the same way it regulates industrial pollution.

A timber industry group says the current EPA policy regulating logging roads with the system used for farm fields is doing a good job, and this challenge just causes disruption.